What’s Your Superpower?

What’s Your Superpower?

Think of SuperMan. He could leap tall buildings in a single bound AFTER he hid in a phone booth, changed his outfit, and became unrecognizable as “Clark Kent.” Is this any different from kids ‘hiding’ their academic talents, their gifted abilities, or even worse, never getting the opportunity to shine?

In classrooms all around the world, there are kids with amazing talents and abilities that are hidden. They go through the school day, much like Clark Kent, with nobody ever realizing that they can leap tall buildings in a single bound. Nobody sees it because they are learning in a curriculum that asks them to climb over a two foot wall. Imagine someone teaching SuperMan to climb over two foot wall? Nobody would do that, because HE can leap buildings. SuperMan can also fly – did you ever see him going through airport security and waiting for his boarding pass? Nope. He just took off.

It’s hard, teachers are stretched thin, school budgets are tight, and it seems the needs in public education are growing. But aren’t there things we can do everyday to let kids explore their own talents, passions, and abilities? A classroom is not a place where kids are made to fit a mold. Rather, the classroom should mold and evolve to what the kids need. We have to tap into differentiation strategies, learning styles, interests, and formative assessments to address kids right where they are at. We need to teach in such a way that they don’t have to hide in a phone booth to fit in.

Seek out their superpowers. You might just find a SuperMan, a SpiderMan, a Wonder Woman, and a Green Lantern in your classroom. It can seem overwhelming trying to meet all those needs. But, starting with one project, one lesson, one day could change everything for the kid whose pretending to be Clark Kent. Here’s your chance to be a superhero for a student.

We don’t need a red cape, and we have something even more powerful than Kryptonite. We have Google. Lucky for us, there are tons of resources out there on the web ready to use with students who need an extra challenge. Here are a few of my favorites:

Just landed on your blog for the first time and I love it! I really love the paragraph, “In classrooms all around the world….” It’s so neat to me that you are speaking from the perspective of a gifted teacher. I teach kids with learning differences and the same thoughts apply! That’s just profound to me.

Did you make the I Teach and I Learn posters? They are amazing. I know the teachers in my school would love them.

[…] recevied a ton of emails this weekend. I was thrilled to see that many of you loved the I Teach: What’s your superpower? design. I always put my graphics on Flickr knowing that you can download them and use them in […]

Thanks for the great insight and resources My husband is a principal and would love to use those awesome graphics as a card or posters for his staff members, perhaps for Christmas or Teacher Appreciation Week. Do you have a printable version available for download or purchase? Thank you!

Kimberly:
I’m now offering the graphic, with complete copyright to produce as many tshirts as you need, in a “screen printer friendly” PDF here: http://teachersnotebook.com/ktvee
Hope this helps you!
Thanks for writing,
Krissy

I am wanting to make a plaque for each of my children’s teachers but they go a to a french immersion school. So I am asking for a big favor; can you put in the French translation for me?
Enseignement est ma superpouvior.
Et le vôtre?
You are awesome and thank you so much for sharing your wonderful ideas.

I am a Department Chair for Teacher Education at Huntingdon College in Alabama. The students in our department want to modify the logo by placing an “H” and a hawk head (our mascot) in the middle of the superman outline in place of the lightbulb for a t-shirt design. I did purchase the logo off of Teacher’s Notebook, but I wanted to get your permission to modify the logo. Is this permissible? The students LOVE the slogan!
Thanks! Dr. Celia Rudolph

I saw your design “I Teach” on Pinterest and loved it. I have seen the quote before and liked it, but your design is definitely the best I have seen.

If possible, I would like to have your design printed on mugs to give to my child’s teachers as an “end of the year” gift. Would this be alright? If so, how do I go about obtaining a photo file. (I am far from tech-saavy.)

Is there a way to receive a full color printed version of the “I Teach’ and “I Learn” posters to put in frames for my classroom. I see that you can design a tshirt but I would rather frame them for my classroom. Thanks, Ashley